Necromancer: Difference between revisions

|'''How to be a Villain''', Neil Zawacki}}

 

 

In typical media they're the epitome of the [[Evil Sorcerer]], showing none of the respect [[Due to the Dead]], using the [[These Are Things Man Was Not Meant to Know|dark arts]] to create an army of [[Dem Bones|skeletons]] and [[Night of the Living Mooks|zombies]] (or any kind of [[The Undead|Undead]] being) to ravage the countryside or enslave souls of the damned for their own evil and twisted purposes. Any villain that practices necromancy is guaranteed to fall hard onto [[The Dark Side|the far side]] of the evil scale, and any hero who dares to dabble in it can kiss his position on the good side [[Moral Event Horizon|good bye]].

 

{{examples}}

* The [[Big Bad]] of [[Fullmetal Alchemist (anime)|the 2003 anime version]] of ''[[Fullmetal Alchemist (manga)|Fullmetal Alchemist]]'' uses forbidden Human Transmutation and could be seen as a necromancer.

* Meiou (Dark/Underworld King) Ixpellia from the ''[[Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha]]'' franchise. The [[Warrior Prince|Ancient Belka king]] who ruled over the Garea empire and had the ability to raise an army of [[Night of the Living Mooks|Mariage]] out of a battlefield of corpses. [[Anti-Anti-Christ|She's actually a nice little girl being forced to do things she doesn't want]], but having an army of cyborg zombies that invades and burns down neighboring countries [[Shrouded in Myth|gave her a rather bad reputation]].

* ''[[Rental Magica]]'' had one overenthusiastic fellow who used a rare magical substance to raise a crowd of zombies and was impatient enough to slaughter a village for this purpose rather than [[Grave Robbing|unobtrusively collect corpses]] like everyone else does. His former supplier; came to wear a widow's outfit after the incident and sent the protagonists to deal with him when he tried to gather another portion of the magic plant on his own. He also used a [[Paper Talisman]] to incapacitate a ghost, but this only made her more upset after she shrugged it off.

 

* As of ''[[Brightest Day]]'', [[Aquaman]] can animate and control the corpses of sea creatures as a side effect of his death and resurrection. As the main page for the comic states, "Summoning a zombie kraken may be the most awesome thing he's ever done."

* Thomas Edison in ''[[Atomic Robo]]''. {{spoiler|Later [[The Undead|Undead Edison]].}}

* [[The Goon]]'s arch enemy, the Nameless man uses massive zombie hordes to do his bidding. He also appears to have knowledge of communicating with spirits.

 

* In both ''[[Excalibur (film)|Excalibur]]'' and ''[[Dragonslayer]]'', the wizards (Merlin and Ulrich respectively) are called necromancers at some point. As neither film involves undead hordes and feature more traditional wizards, it is clear the older meaning is being invoked.

* {{spoiler|William Dobb}} from [[Dead and Buried]] is an excellent example of this, what with {{spoiler|him making a town entirely populated by zombies of his own creation, who he views as his children and his works of art, as well as a very unhealthy interest in the dead.}}

 

* Malory mentions that Morgan learnt "nigromancy"... in a nunnery...

** While most of her magic doesn't seem that related to the dead, she is the one who ends up taking Arthur to Avalon... which has interesting implications.

* In [[J. R. R. Tolkien]]'s ''[[The Hobbit]]'', Sauron was called "the Necromancer" (though in this case it probably meant controlling the spirits of the dead, not their corpses). Given Tolkien's influence on the fantasy genre, this could be the [[Trope Maker]].

** Sauron appears to have more control over the corpses of the dead than their spirits, if the Barrow-Wights are anything to go by; according to the supplementary materials they are evil spirits (not the souls of the original deceased) sent by the Witch-King of Angmar, Sauron's [[The Dragon|Dragon]] to possess the bodies of dead kings to torment their former subjects.

** Note that they use the classical definition of contacting spirits to ask about the future, which is apparently evil. Contacting them to ask about the present or past, on the other hand, is okay.

* [[Garth Nix]]'s ''[[Old Kingdom]]'' trilogy features several necromancers as villains—and the Abhorsen, who has similar powers but uses them to fight necromancers and other undead threats.

* In [[Edgar Rice Burroughs]]'s ''[[John Carter of Mars|The Chessman of Mars]]'', Tara is accused of being "one of those horrid Corphals that by commanding the spirits of the wicked dead gains evil mastery over the living"—which could only be killed by [[Royal Blood]].

* Subverted in ''[[Septimus Heap]]'': DomDaniel is referred to as a necromancer, but none of his abilities match the epithet.

* Necromancy is naturally an important part of ''[[The Witch Watch]]'', given that the start involves the protagonist being raised from the dead ''by mistake.''

 

* Ned, the main character of ''[[Pushing Daisies]]''. The soul gets revived along with the person in his instance, so no zombies. In fact, one of the first things he says in the series is an objection to those he revives being called undead, when they're merely "alive again".

** There are, however, plenty of gruesome cases where it's probably a blessing that he sticks to his guideline of keeping them alive for only one minute (otherwise something else dies); at any rate, even the better cases aren't quite normal afterward, as while they ''can'' be killed again (and thus permanently), they nonetheless stop aging.

* ''[[Angel]]'' refers to necromancers on occasion, and features Los Angeles necromancer Magnus Hainsley as a minor villain in the last season. As expected from a series that constantly subverts fantasy and horror tropes, Magnus turns out to be a short, bald fast-talker who seems more like a car salesman than a sorcerer. He does prove to be a powerful enemy, though, given that he has "power over the dead" and the heroes confronting him are a vampire and a ghost (or close enough to a ghost for his purposes).

 

* [[Rush]]'s ''"The Necromancer"''.

 

* In ''[[Descendant of a Demon Lord]]'', Necromancy is a highly esoteric (and depending on the location, illegal) discipline of magic. In 7.1, Celes [[Press-Ganged|aggressively recruited]] some bandits to be her soldiers, telling them she'd kill them and animate their corpses if necessary, and some of those listening seemed to consider necromancy not real. Necromancers are almost always bad people, but necromancy is not regarded as something inherently evil by many sorcerers or other monsters. Like most tools, it can be used for good or bad. Unsurprisingly many decent sorcerers would jump at the chance to learn necromancy no strings attached. Still, since necromancers tend to be bad, they are often distrusted.

* The protagonist of ''[[Vigor Mortis]]'' is a natural necromancer, whose existence contradicts the doctrine of the dominant religion where she lives, and where most magic is regulated, necromancy is one of the few schools of magic that is outright banned.

 

* A good deal of ''[[Magic: The Gathering]]'' creatures are called necromancers, while the actual creatures generally have creatures types of cleric or wizards. Users of [[Black Magic]] in the settings tend to have dead minions.

* ''[[Dungeons & Dragons]]'' has Necromancy as one of its schools of magic. Its practitioners were called necromancers.

** ''[[Geist: The Sin Eaters]]'' has the Necromancer Archetype; however, it's less about raising the dead and more about understanding the mysteries of death and the Underworld. Though, as the titular Sin-Eaters have death-themed powers (making them ''all'' necromancers in a way), there are of course rituals to raise zombies.

* ''[[GURPS]]'' has the Necromantic College of magic. In fact, the highest-level Healing spell, Resurrection, requires its casters to know some necromancy, including Summon Spirit.

* In ''[[Exalted]]'', Necromancy is to Sorcery as the Underworld is to Creation; a deadened reflective parody, requiring a different set of initiation Charms to access and being a form of [[Mutually Exclusive Magic]]—see that page for more details. Whereas Sorcery is derived from Creation's living Essence, Necromancy is derived from the necrotic, decayed Essence of the Underworld—and ultimately, [[Power of the Void|the Void.]]

* ''[[Warhammer Fantasy Battle]]'' has mortal necromancers, vampires, and the Egyptian themed lich-priests. There's also Nagash, the first and greatest necromancer, an [[Omnicidal Maniac]] who attempted to raise all the dead of the world as his servants. It used to be that necromancy automatically drove one insane; this seems to have been relaxed, though the vast majority of necromancers are still villainous.

** The setting makes a difference between those that use the lore of death (more classical necromancy, communicating with the dead and one of the eight winds of magic) and those that use necromancy (animating the dead, a form of dark magic).

 

* In ''[[Battle for Wesnoth]]'', necromancers are quite common, and are the reason for [[The Undead]] being a faction in themselves and a major, recurring threat to Wesnoth. The allure of immense power and potential immortality (via transformation into a Lich) draws in practitioners of the dark arts, and although the extreme strain of their training causes most of these 'Dark Adepts' to become [[Squishy Wizard|extremely frail and weak physically]], it does give them [[Glass Cannon|impressive magical firepower]]. The Adepts' higher-level promotions, the Dark Sorcerer, Necromancer, and Lich, often lead the Undead armies in battle, making them perhaps the most powerful individuals in the Wesnoth-verse.<ref>(the characters, not the actual units)</ref> However, they are hated by everyone. ''[[0% Approval Rating|Everyone]]''. Necromancers, both alive and undead, have been involved in so many wars and battles throughout the various campaigns, since before the creation of the titular kingdom to hundreds of years after it's fall, that they have become somewhat of a cliche in Wesnoth.

* A core profession in the MMO ''[[Guild Wars]]'', which can animate fleshy minions from corpses, vampirize heath, and fling curses (and [[Combat Sadomasochist|they often have to sacrifice a percentage of their health bar to do so]]). There's also the Ritualist class introduced in Factions, which are Necromancers of a sort dealing in binding the spirits of the dead rather than animating corpses. The game is heavily geared to dual-class, and unsurprisingly, these two work ''great'' in combination, whichever is primary.

** Zorbak's robot in ''[[Warp Force]]'', Zorboz, can reanimate ''machines'' and turn them undead.

* The February 2012 update of ''[[Dwarf Fortress]]'' features them. It's actually the first type of magic put in the game, and being Dwarf Fortress, the players themselves are able to use it. Keep in mind, so are migrants to your fortress, and even random merchants or whoever else reads one of the "secrets of the life and death" written on slabs by the gods, which inconveniently results in body parts in the refuse pile coming to life and attacking you.

* The first ''[[Golden Sun]]'' didn't have many references to necromancy, but ''The Lost Age'' has the Dark Mage class series, unlocked with an artifact in a small [[Bonus Dungeon]] under Kibombo (where it's normally kept for the local witch-doctors to use), which can summon zombies and inflict curses upon enemies, among other things.

** ''Dark Dawn'' doesn't have class-enabling artifacts like the Tomegathericon, and by extension no Dark Mage classes... but Himi's exclusive Curse Mage class series does much of the same, which is pretty weird since she's normally a cute little [[Shrine Maiden]].

* ''[[Monster Girl Quest]]'' has Chrome, who can only raise near-mindless zombies that are [[Zombie Gait|very slow]], and the far more competent La Croix, who's capable of raising Queen-class monsters, dragons and even {{spoiler|a Monster Lord}} with the same intelligence they had in life.

* In ''[[Wizard 101]]'', the Death School is one of seven schools available to players. [[What Do You Mean It's for Kids?|You know, cause this game is for kids!]]

 

* Black Mage Evilwizardington of ''[[8-Bit Theater]]'' is skilled at necromancy. He reconstructed and redecorated the Temple of Fiends by willing it to change, as it was made from corpses.

* Xykon from ''[[The Order of the Stick]]''.

* ''[[The Questport Chronicles]]'' has a necromancer—a [[Cloudcuckoolander]] who is infamous for [[Noodle Incident|resurrecting certain spirits accidentally]].

 

* Dr. Byron Orpheus of ''[[The Venture Brothers]]'' is a professional necromancer. Though a [[Large Ham]], he is (arguably) one of the ''nicest'' people in the series. He is quite polite when speaking with dead souls, and is horrified when he thinks that his attempted resurrection of {{spoiler|Hank and Dean}} has instead resulted in bringing them back as zombies.

** Although he does trap the souls of two "foul mouthed rednecks" in some dolls after they wouldn't stop calling him gay. One would think that he'd be used to it, judging by the way he looks and dresses.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Characters As Device]]

[[Category:Undead Index]]

[[Category:Paranormal Tropes]]

[[Category:Wizards and Witches]]